The Corner House Girls Among the Gypsies Part 5

"Neale!" admonished Ruth. "_Such_ slang!"

"Come on, Neale," said the excited Agnes. "Let you and me go down to Byburg's and ask her about the bracelet."

"I really don't see how June can tell us anything," observed Ruth slowly.

"Anyway," Agnes briskly said, putting on her hat, "we need some candy.

Come on, Neale."

The Wildwoods were Southerners who had not lived long in Milton. Their story is told in "The Corner House Girls Under Canvas." The Kenways were very well acquainted with Juniper Wildwood and her sister, Rosa. Agnes felt privileged to question June about her life with the Gypsies.

"I saw Big Jim in town the other day," confessed the girl behind the candy counter the moment Agnes broached the subject. "I am awfully afraid of him. I ran all the way home. And I told Mr. Budd, the policeman on this beat, and I think Mr. Budd warned Big Jim to get out of town. There is some talk about getting a law through the Legislature putting a heavy tax on each Gypsy family that does not keep moving.

_That_ will drive them away from Milton quicker than anything else. And that Big Jim is a bad, bad man. Why! he's been in jail for stealing."

"Oh, my! He's a regular convict, then," gasped Agnes, much impressed.

"Pshaw!" said Neale. "They don't call a man a convict unless he has been sent to the State prison, or to the Federal penitentiary. But that Big Jim looked to be tough enough, when we saw him down at Pleasant Cove, to belong in prison for life. Remember him, Aggie?"

"The children did not say anything about a Gypsy man," observed his friend. "There were two Gypsy women."

She went on to tell June Wildwood all about the basket purchase and the finding of the silver bracelet. The older girl shook her head solemnly as she said:

"I don't understand it at all. Gypsies are always shrewd bargainers.

They never sell things for less than they cost."

"But they made that basket," Agnes urged. "Perhaps it didn't cost them so much as Ruth thinks."

June smiled in a superior way. "Oh, no, they didn't make it. They don't waste their time nowadays making baskets when they can buy them from the factories so much cheaper and better. Oh, no!"

"Crackey!" exclaimed Neale. "Then they are fakers, are they?"

"That bracelet is no fake," declared Agnes.

"That is what puzzles me most," said June. "Gypsies are very tricky. At least, all I ever knew. And if those two women you speak of belonged to Big Jim's tribe, I would not trust them at all."

"But it seems they have done nothing at all bad in this case," Agnes observed.

"Tess and Dot are sure ahead of the game, so far," chuckled Neale in agreement.

"Just the same," said June Wildwood, "I would not be careless. Don't let the children talk to the Gypsies if they come back for the bracelet. Be sure to have some older person see the women and find out what they want. Oh, they are very sly."

June had then to attend to other customers, and Agnes and Neale walked home. On the way they decided that there was no use in scaring the little ones about the Gypsies.

"I don't believe in bugaboos," Agnes declared. "We'll just tell Ruth."

This she proceeded to do. But perhaps she did not repeat June Wildwood's warning against the Gypsy band with sufficient emphasis to impress Ruth's mind. Or just about this time the older Corner House girl had something of much graver import to trouble her thought.

By special delivery, on this evening just before they retired, arrived an almost incoherent letter from Cecile Shepard, part of which Ruth read aloud to Agnes:

"... and just as Aunt Lorina is only beginning to get better! I feel as though this family is fated to have trouble this year. Luke was doing so well at the hotel and the proprietor liked him. It isn't _his_ fault that that outside stairway was untrustworthy and fell with him. The doctor says it is only a strained back and a broken wrist.

But Luke is in bed. I am going by to-morrow's train to see for myself.

I don't dare tell Aunt Lorina--nor even Neighbor. Neighbor--Mr.

Northrup--is not well himself, and he would only worry about Luke if he knew.... Now, don't _you_ worry, and I will send you word how Luke is just the minute I arrive."

"But how can I help being anxious?" Ruth demanded of her sister. "Poor Luke! And he was working so hard this summer so as not to be obliged to depend entirely on Neighbor for his college expenses next year."

Ruth was deeply interested in Luke Shepard--had been, in fact, since the winter previous when all the Corner House family were s...o...b..und at the Birdsall winter camp in the North Woods. Of course, Ruth and Luke were both very young, and Luke had first to finish his college course and get into business.

Still and all, the fact that Luke Shepard had been hurt quite dwarfed the Gypsy bracelet matter in Ruth's mind. And in that of Agnes, too, of course.

In addition, the very next morning Mrs. Pinkney ran across the street and in at the side door of the Corner House in a state of panic.

"Oh! have you seen him?" she cried.

"Seen whom, Mrs. Pinkney?" asked Ruth with sympathy.

"Is Buster lost again?" demanded Tess, poising a spoonful of breakfast food carefully while she allowed her curiosity to take precedence over the business of eating. "That dog always _is_ getting lost."

"It isn't Sammy's dog," wailed Mrs. Pinkney. "It is Sammy himself. I can't find him."

"Can't find Sammy?" repeated Agnes.

"His bed hasn't been slept in! I thought he was just sulky last night.

But he is _gone_!"

"Well," said Tess, practically, "Sammy is always running away, you know."

"Oh, this is serious," cried the distracted mother. "He has broken open his bank and taken all his money--almost four dollars."

"My!" murmured Dot, "it must cost lots more to run away and be pirates now than it used to."

"Everything is much higher," agreed Tess.

CHAPTER V--SAMMY OCCASIONS MUCH EXCITEMENT

"I do hope and pray," Aunt Sarah Maltby declared, "that Mrs. Pinkney won't go quite distracted about that boy. Boys make so much trouble usually that a body would near about believe that it must be an occasion for giving thanks to get rid of one like Sammy Pinkney."

This was said of course after Sammy's mother had gone home in tears--and Agnes had accompanied her to give such comfort as she might. The whole neighborhood was roused about the missing Sammy. All agreed that the boy never was of so much importance as when he was missing.

"I do hope and pray that the little rascal will turn up soon," continued Aunt Sarah, "for Mrs. Pinkney's sake."

"I wonder," murmured Dot to Tess, "why it is Aunt Sarah always says she 'hopes and prays'? Wouldn't just praying be enough? You're sure to get what you pray for, aren't you?"

"But what is the use of praying if you don't hope?" demanded Tess, the hair-splitting theologian. "They must go together, Dot. I should think you'd see that."

Mrs. Pinkney had lost hope of finding Sammy, however, right at the start. She knew him of course of old. He had been running away ever since he could toddle out of the gate; but she and Mr. Pinkney tried to convince themselves that each time would be the last--that he was "cured."